A landmark report from Equality Australia has concluded discrimination in religious schools and institutions against the LGBTQIA+ community is “endemic”.
There are more than 70,000 students and 10,000 staff members in non-government schools who identify as LGBTQIA+, Equality Australia’s report says, and these students are more likely to attend a school that discriminates against them than one that supports them.
The report comes amid public political debate on a religious discrimination parliamentary bill, which is expected to be discussed in parliament this week.
Ghassan Kassisieh, the legal director at Equality Australia, said the findings from the report show Australian legislation allows independent schools, particularly religious schools, to discriminate against LGBTQIA+ students and staff, and the current provisions are “out of step” with international humanitarian law and practice.
“We have uncovered the tip of an ugly iceberg of LGBTQ+ discrimination,” Kassisieh said.
“For every person who speaks publicly there are countless more who have either been discriminated against because of who they are, or are hiding it because they fear the repercussions.”
The report found that Australian Catholic schools in particular are the main culprits for discriminatory behaviours towards LGBTQIA+ students and staff, with Equality Australia receiving 26 personal accounts of discrimination in their research.
Out of ten Catholic schools reviewed in the report, which educate 70 per cent of Catholic school students in the country, nine of them did not have enough information about LGBTQIA+ inclusion, so much so that prospective parents, students or employees could not tell if they would be welcomed or face discrimination at the school. This was the case for one in three non-religious independent schools in Australia.
“We are talking about students who have been forced out of school or teachers who have been fired from their jobs or denied promotions,” Equality Australia’s legal director Ghassan Kassisieh said.
“In other cases, children have been told they are going to hell.
“This points to a systemic suppression of LGBTQ+ identities and lives. For a young person coming of age and exploring who they are, silences about LGBTQ+ people are deafening.
“Silence says to LGBTQ+ people they must remain hidden and ashamed of who they are if they want to keep their jobs or stay at school.”
Why can religious institutions discriminate against the LGBTQIA+ community?
In Australia, the Sex Discrimination Act is federal legislation that protects people from discrimination based on sex, sexuality, gender and marital status.
However, the law includes legal loopholes that exempt religious schools and institutions from complying to the Sex Discrimination Act.
This means religious schools, for example, can expel a student, fire an employee or deny someone a leadership opportunity because they identify as gay or trans.
Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania, the ACT and the Northern Territory have their own state laws to ban discrimination against LGBTQIA+ students and staff in religious schools, so non-government religious schools in these states cannot expel students or fire staff members who are LGBTQIA+.
Equality Australia describes the laws in South Australia “weak and unclear” when it comes to protecting the LGBTQIA+ community from discrimination. New South Wales and Western Australia are described to have some of “the worst laws in the country”.
The Hon Michael Kirby AC CMG, a former justice of the High Court of Australia, said the allowance for religious schools to discriminate against the LGBTQIA+ community, enabled by the Australian legal system, is “neither principled nor just”.
“There is increasing understanding, and broad acceptance in Australia, that the past overly broad religious exemptions go beyond what is essential and sometimes diminish the enjoyment of the dignity and rights of others,” Kirby said.
As a result, discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community occurs not just in religious schools, but in other religious institutions. According to Equality Australia’s report, one in ten of Australia’s largest faith-based service providers are public in their discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community. What’s more, about four in ten are silent on their position on LGBTQIA+ inclusion.
What is the government doing about it?
When marriage equality laws were passed in Australia in 2017, the debate on “religious freedoms” began with a review, led by former Liberal minister Philip Ruddock, which recommended stronger protections against religious discrimination.
In 2018, former prime minister Scott Morrison promised legislation that would provide that protection. Over the next three years, the Morrison government proposed several versions of the Religious Discrimination Bill that did two things; firstly, the Bill proposed the prohibition of discrimination against people on the basis of their religion; secondly, and perhaps most notably, the Bill removed anti-discrimination protections and allowed discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community.
While the legislation never passed, Anthony Albanese made an election promise in 2022 to bring the debate back on the table and pass laws that would ban discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community in religious schools and institutions.
In the last couple of weeks, it has been reported that the debate is likely to be raised in parliament this week. However, with concerns about having a “respectful” debate, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is calling on bipartisanship to avoid a “culture war”.
Anna Brown, the CEO of Equality Australia, said it is time the current government address the issue of LGBTQIA+ discrimination.
“Successive federal governments have failed to address these gaps in the law which directly impact so many people from our community,” Brown said.
“We have spent more than a decade raising this issue, with many reviews and attempts to change the law.
“It is not acceptable for a religious school – or any employer – to discriminate against a person because they are gay or transgender, or because they refuse to be complicit in discrimination against LGBTQ+ people.”